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Wednesday, May 17, 2006

May night ride

I tried to ease back into biking with a loop ride after work today. At 5 p.m. the wind was fierce and traffic was heavy, so I cut the ride short (I am the queen of the "If it's not fun, why bother?" justification.)

But when the calm of evening took over, I begin to rethink my riding routine. It seems a waste, really, to spend an entire ride fighting rush hour when prime time actually falls much later these days. As I unpacked from my vacation and watched soft light descend on the horizon out the window, I decided to squeeze in 15 more miles. It was 10:05 p.m.

I set out with my back to the sun, still perched in a blaze of orange above the tips of skeleton spruce trees to the southwest. The air was so calm I could almost hear its silence, amplified further by the occasional bird chirp or the distant hum of a motor. Traffic was nonexistant. People were in bed. I was just getting warmed up.

I can already tell that these months of almost endless daylight are going to seriously cut into my sleep habits. How can I resist riding when I'm just hitting my energy peak, the evening sky is at its most scenic and I have an entire sleepy little town to myself? That dosen't change the fact that I still have to be up and at work by 7 to 9 a.m. every day. No matter. It's light then, too.

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